Macomb company continues Hobby Lobby fight against contraception

Weingartz part of suit challenging Obamacare contraception mandate

In the wake of a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision in the so-called Hobby Lobby case, Macomb County-based Weingartz Supply Company may be poised to push the envelope a bit further in allowing businesses the freedom to ban all forms of contraception from their employee health care benefits.

The Hobby Lobby ruling issued by the high court said that family businesses with devout religious beliefs did not have to meet the Obama administration’s mandate that all employer-provided health care must include a full range of birth control coverage.

But Weingartz, which sells and repairs products such as lawn mowers and snow blowers at five southeast Michigan locations, is still in the game, from a legal standpoint. The company, based in Utica and with stores in Ann Arbor, Cedar Springs, Clarkston and Farmington Hills as well, was the second in the nation to secure a federal injunction against the Obamacare contraception mandate in October 2012.

Company president Dan Weingartz is a member of an Ann Arbor-based nonprofit, Legatus, which has ties to Tom Monaghan and consists of more than 4,000 devout Catholic business owners and executives across the nation. Legatus, the Latin word for ambassador, seeks to spread the tenets of the Catholic faith.

Monaghan, former owner of Domino’s Pizza and the Detroit Tigers, put the Thomas More Law School that he helped form in charge of the lawsuit filed by Weingartz, one of five Michigan companies with cases still pending that could eventually hone the Hobby Lobby decision.

As the Weingartz case sits dormant in Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati, the company’s attorney remains a bit coy about the legal strategy that might be followed next.

Erin Mersino asserts the details of the Supreme Court’s ruling in the case brought by Hobby Lobby, an arts and crafts chain with 575 stores nationwide, have been misinterpreted.

Hobby Lobby already provides full coverage for 16 forms of birth control, according to numerous news reports, but the court upheld the company’s right to block four types of “morning after” pills and Intra-Uterine Devices that violate the Catholic belief that life begins at conception.

Mersino suggested her client believes that the federal Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 exempts Weingartz from providing insurance coverage for any form of contraception.

“My client’s beliefs conform with the teachings of the Catholic church,” she said.

Dan Weingartz, who could not be reached for comment, carries on a family business formed in 1945. They have 170 employees who receive health care benefits but have never received any form of insurance coverage for birth control.

Cases pending across the nation that challenge the Obamacare mandate could shape the Hobby Lobby precedent in the future because the Supreme Court justices did not define the “closely held” corporations with “sincere” religious beliefs that can avoid contraception coverage.

The religious freedom law of 21 years ago requires the federal government to impose new rules and regulation by the “least restrictive means” when confronting religious freedom issues cited by an employer. Mersino said the high court should have considered that employees can receive birth control products from community health clinics for an inexpensive price, rather than relying upon employer-provided benefits.

Mersino also said the federal fines that would be imposed upon Weingartz for failing to heed the Obamacare mandate – amounting to $100 per day, per employee – would soon add up to $6.2 million.